It was a bright, sunny day when I went to jail. Pretty sure Mrs. Willard, our psychology teacher, cooked up this field trip to scare us. We’re in the tenth grade; it’s not like some of us haven’t already gotten high on a few things. I haven’t, mind you, but I’d know who to ask if I ever wanted to. The pigmented, smooth, leather seats of the old school bus were hot against my bare legs. The school bus doesn’t have air conditioning, and cracking the windows open doesn’t keep my skin from feeling sweaty. Staring at the black ceiling above me, I remember how noisy the bus was: me, Brielle and a few of the other girls were talking about the upcoming homecoming dance. We were going shopping that weekend for dresses; none of us had yet been asked, but everybody knew River would take Brielle. I hoped Isaac would ask me. The boys sat in the back of the bus, roughhousing and talking about the game. The sound of the wind whistling in through the cracked windows swirled with the sound of the engine to make the ride loud and bumpy.

And then the bus slowed.

I sat by the window, and the noise quietened as we looked out. It was impossible not to notice the barbed wire fence with the big circles at the top. It was hard not to look at the inmates in orange jumpsuits playing basketball inside the fenced area, or to overlook the large brown watchtower that stood just outside the fenced yard. It was impossible not to wonder what each of them had done to find themselves here.

“Bet at least one of ’em’s in for murder,” Drew mumbled, jumping from the back of the bus to the seat behind me and Brielle.

“Murderers get sent to, like, prison, not low ass security jails.” Walker turned in his seat to watch the inmates as the bus rolled past the yard to the entrance.

I pulled the end of my hair between my fingers and tugged. I wasn’t scared–the school never would have allowed us to go on this organized field trip if it were dangerous–but butterflies still swam in my belly. Nervous butterflies. We were going to get to talk to a few of the inmates, ask them questions; we were going to see where they lived and how they spent their days. What if they were dangerous?

No one knew it, no one would have ever guessed, but doing well in school wasn’t just a fluke. It wasn’t because my parents forced me to do well. It wasn’t because of a burning need to become a doctor or a lawyer or anything like that. Doing well in school is — was — is — because I don’t want to be my family. My dad’s been here–not here, not in that jail, necessarily, but in jail. Many times. He’s not violent, he’s never hurt anybody. He just has a problem, a serious problem, with things like drugs and stealing. We’ve only lived in New Hannah Cove for a few months. I don’t even know why we picked it: it’s too nice, the houses are too big, everybody’s parents are doctors or CEO’s of big companies. We’re thieves. Thieves playing pretend. He found a house and someone who let us rent from them (yes, we’re renters because we don’t have the means to buy. Honestly, even if we did, why would we bother, knowing that we’d need to move again soon?). We were excited to be moving to the exclusive neighborhood, the It neighborhood. If only we’d found a house somewhere else…

Mom didn’t want me going to see him at the jail when I was younger, but I went a few times in middle school to see him. It was a different city, a different state, but when you’re a visitor, you don’t get to see much of the jail itself. Just the waiting room and then, depending on the security level of the jail, you are taken to a long room that’s divided in half by Plexiglas and stalls. You sit on a stool, pick up a telephone and the inmate sits on the other side of the glass and picks up a phone and you talk until the guard tells you the time is over. That’s if the jail has a high level of security. If it’s a low level detention center, you’re taken to a large room that’s not unlike the cafeteria at school. The inmates come into the room and there are no barriers between you and the inmate. You’re allowed to hug them, but you can’t kiss or anything like that. For the record, Dad’s been in both. The latter is a lot better; there are usually vending machines in those large, cafeteria-style visiting areas, so you can relax a little more. Regardless, though, of which type of jail you’re in, you only get to see the visitor’s room. You don’t get to see the actual cells. I’d asked a couple of times what they were like and Dad always said, Like having a closet for a bedroom.

I was nervous, that day of the field trip. Nervous because Dad told stories sometimes about how dangerous jail was, how the other inmates might get you for no reason. One time, he actually asked to be moved to solitary confinement because he was scared of these other two guys. Solitary confinement: the term makes me pause, like I’d just gotten a brain freeze from taking too big a drink of a Sonic Slush. Solitary confinement: that’s what I’m in, that’s what this is. Solitary confinement. Panic bubbles, tightening my chest. I pull in a breath through my mouth, breathe it out through my nose, shake my head. Anyway, that’s why I was nervous, the day of the field trip. I didn’t know if I wanted to see the guys my dad was afraid of. And also — I didn’t know if I wanted to see how he lived when he was on a work trip. The first time I remember him getting arrested, it happened at my school (thank God it was not this school). When I walked out of the school building, he was parked in the line of parents waiting to pick up kids. I’d just reached the car when, just like a swarm of bees, three cops descended on us. Kids saw them put handcuffs on Dad, lead him away. When I started crying, he winked at me and said, Don’t cry, kiddo, just going away for a work trip. I’ll be back. After that, whenever he was arrested, he’d write me letters from jail, telling me how work was going. Eight year old me was mad at him for embarrassing me like that, getting arrested in front of my friends (eight-year-old me didn’t return to that school: Mom took me out and enrolled me somewhere else) but, mostly, I tried to pretend his work life wasn’t real. I was scared that seeing the cells, seeing the catwalk, seeing the other prisoners, would make it more real, what he went through.

Of all the things to be afraid of.

The cells we saw that day in the field trip measured sixty-five sq feet.

Sixty-five sq feet. My cell is one hundred eighty two sq feet. If this were a jail cell, there would likely be a bunk bed and I’d have someone sharing the space with me. My eyes stare blankly up at the ceiling. It’s not like the jail we visited, it’s not like the bus we rode on: this space is silent. He said it’s been built to block even the smallest sound from leaving the room. Decoupled floors, floating ceilings, vinyl and insulation materials to fill the crevices. Money is no issue for me, and I didn’t want to take any shortcuts on something as important as your new home. There are no windows. There is air conditioning but I can’t hear it kick on or off. In fact, I can only hear whatever noise I make. I can hear myself breathing. It is the only noise most days. It drives me crazy. There is no light. Ever. The lack of windows means I can’t tell when it’s day and when it’s night. There’s not a clock in here, either. Only a bed, a pot for me to use the bathroom that he empties every other day and the pad of paper and pen he left me. You didn’t take away his ability to write, so I won’t take away yours.

My eyes slide to the pad of paper that sits in the corner where’s it’s sat since I got here. At first, there was nothing to write: anything I write in that notebook, he’ll read, and I don’t want him to know anything I’m thinking. I don’t want him to know anything more about me than he already does.

But…

Back in the day, when people were trapped in jail, they couldn’t write honest letters home cause the wardens read everything, you know, and censor whatever they want out of the letters. So, it’s gotta be like this game of saying only stuff that can’t get you in trouble. Phones are tapped, stuff like that. I never knew how much of Dad’s stories were true, but this one has been playing in my mind lately. Sometimes, when prisons were new like, women would stand on the free side, the outside of the yard, and the men would fold up honest letters like airplanes and send them sailing out the windows. Sometimes they wouldn’t get far enough and they’d just be in the yard the next day. But, every now and then, some ole bloke would get lucky. The wind would carry his letter just far enough that it’d get beyond the fence. The woman would scoop it up and carry it home and read what her man really wanted to tell her. Letters been hidden everywhere in the prison, too. If you do it good enough, it’ll stay there a long time. Lot of dead men walking have said more than people will know for a long, long time. Only when they go to clean the air ducts or do an excavation of the walls will they find some surprising shit.

For the first time in a long time, I sit up, my bare feet hitting the cold cement floor. I tug the end of my hair with my fingers, twisting the black strands around the end of my first finger. I drop down, sitting against the wall, picking up the notebook. Every now and then, he takes me to the big house. He takes me out of here. I have no idea how long it’s been since I left home, but I know I’ve been in his house three times, each time spending a few days with him. He puts an ankle bracelet on me, he shows me the security cameras, he leaves me in the same room with Wolf, the bloodhound, until I am trembling with fear and then he gives me the freedom of the house. If I’m a prisoner, I might as well act like one. I can write a note, I can hide it. I’ll put it somewhere on me before he comes, take it with me from here to the house, keep it hidden. The cameras would see me, but maybe I could think of a way to conceal what I’m doing, to make it look like I’m doing something else. Likely, no one will find it. But I come from a family of pretenders. I can pretend they will.

But what do I say?

There’s only one thing I can think of.